Dowbrigade

It’s not a typical union-management battle: One of the
nation’s largest nursing home companies is charging that some Haitian
workers at its Wakefield facility voted to form a union because they
believed if they did not, a co-worker would use voodoo against them.

Harborside Healthcare at Wakefield cq, a nursing and rehabilitation
center, formally objected to the workers’ recent vote to unionize, saying
an
employee, Marie Chery cq, threatened co-workers who refused to vote for
the union with voodoo, possibly swaying the election.

The battle comes as Haitian religious leaders and advocates are aggressively
seeking to improve working conditions in nursing homes. Advocates say
Haitians make up about 80 percent of nursing home employees throughout
greater Boston, and their workplaces have become a key battleground
for union organizers.

‘They lost the election 2 to 1 so they had to trump up charges," Celia
Wcislo, president of Local 2020, said to the angry crowd of about 75
that circled outside 1 Beacon St., the site of a Harborside corporate
office. Some protesters carried signs that said ”Voodoo doesn’t win
elections. Workers do."

Ah, but thousands of impoverished workers motivated by Voodoo, now that’s
a prescription for winning elections! Just ask Papa Doc, if you have
a line to the hereafter.

Actually, this
Voodoo stuff might work out well for the nursing home industry. We
can see it now, competition for patients based on the power and majesty
of the competing voodoo priests and priestesses. "Tutuba’s Golden Autumn
Rest Home features a personal and long-standing arrangement with Ogou
Balanjo (voodoo Spirit of Healing) to protect all our patients from the
dreaded Baron Samedi (Guardian of the Grave.)"

Full disclosure – In our own personal
hierarchy of Caribbean cults, we have always preferred Rastafarianism
to Voodoo. Note to children: make sure we end up in a Rasta Rest Home,
por favor. Jah, out….

from the Boston Globe

by Sohn Hae-yong, Kim Ho-jeong, JoongAng Daily, April 21, 2005

Six elephants from a Laotian circus escaped from Seoul Children’s Grand
Park yesterday, most remaining at large for well over an hour, causing
traffic jams and breaking into restaurants and homes. All were captured
unhurt; a woman was injured.

Around 3 p.m., nine elephants were being paraded past an audience of children
and parents in the park in Gwangjin, northeastern Seoul, when one burst out of
line and fled. Five others followed.

One was caught by trainers just outside the park. Police and firefighters caught
the second about an hour and a half later. Three more were captured by trainers
soon afterward, near Konkuk University.

But as those three were being walked back to the park, they broke free again
and burst into a samgyeopsal (grilled bacon) restaurant, where they overturned
tables as diners fled. The elephants began eating carrots, the report said. A
waitress said she hid in a closet until they left. They were captured in front
of the restaurant.

from (indirectly) Tom
Coyner’s Korea Economic Reader

No
wonder the man was always wearing a yarmulke!

Now that
he can’t defend himself, we guess he’s fair game. Frank Weltner Ace
Reporter, Director,
Librarian,
and
Publicist
of "The Scholarly Web Site", Jew
Watch, has once again stunned the world
with his penetrating investigative reporting and lack of taste,
by going to press with a story titled "JEW
WATCH OUTS POPE JOHN PAUL II".

After an exhaustive examination of rumor, legend and unrelated historical
information, the article concludes "He is of probable Jewish Descent".
Note the Scholarly tone…

Jew Watch Headquarters, St. Louis, Missouri, April 6, 2005– – Today,
Jew Watch NEWS outed Pope John Paul II’s probable Jewish ancestry
on its
nine-year-old scholarly web site located on the Internet at www.jewwatch.com.

"The Pope’s mother was Emily Katz, whose Polish name is "Emilia
Kaczorowska," which is usually Anglicized by American immigrants
to the familiar sounding, "Emily Katz."

We can’t wait for Weltner’s explication of how the new Pope, ex-Hitler
Youth, is also Jewish…

from Jew Watch News

The destitution of a duly elected President is just another holiday
in the wild, wacky world of Ecuadorian politics. From the Nwe York Times:

BOGOTA, Colombia, April 20 – President Lucio Guti?rrez of Ecuador fled
his presidential palace on Wednesday after the Congress, meeting in special
session, voted to remove him. The Congress then swore in Vice President
Alfredo Palacio, a 66-year-old cardiologist, to replace Mr. Guti?rrez,
48, a former army colonel who had faced mounting street protests against
what critics called an illegal overhaul of the Supreme Court.

translations of the headlines in El
Universo, from Guayaqil:

Quito Brought Down Lucio

OAS recesses until tomorrow to take up case of Ecuador

President’s Brother Flees Brazilian Embassy

Iberia Airlines flight diverted to Bogota Due to Caos

Brazil awards asylum to Lucio

Palacio, A Cardiologist to the Presidency

Herre is a link to El Commercio, the Ecuadorian Wall Street Journal
and the top paper in the capital, Quito, but their web site is down this
morning, perhaps from too much traffic….